


let me be the one to hold you

by owenwilsonvevo



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Mpreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-06 23:59:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17355101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owenwilsonvevo/pseuds/owenwilsonvevo
Summary: “I’m fucked,” he says into Freddie's shoulder, and his voice is thick. He’s determined not to start crying, but now that he’s clutching the tests in one hand it’s getting harder to pretend like it isn’t real, like he isn’t standing in Freddie's kitchen in fuzzy socks and adidas trackies, shaking and fucking pregnant, what thefuck?





	let me be the one to hold you

**Author's Note:**

> me again!!! back this time with a prompt fill because niche shit is my shit, apparently >:)
> 
> side note: most of the inspiration for this came from the knowledge that roger flies off the handle quite easily. enjoy!

“Fuck,” Roger says. He says it to the empty, otherwise silent bathroom, and it ricochets off the tile at his feet, sharp and sudden in the silence. He can barely hear it over the ringing in his ears.

“ _Fuck_!” He snaps again. Freddie and Deaky are sitting just outside the bathroom door, cross legged, eavesdropping, but he doesn’t care if they can hear him. He kicks out at the bathtub as hard as he can, and the noise that his foot makes as it connects with the porcelain reverberates against the walls of their small, cluttered bathroom. Pain shoots up Roger’s leg, and it does nothing to ease the sudden, panicked anger, the frustration, that’s settled into his bones, that’s making his skin feel like it’s been pulled on too tightly. He kicks at the bottom of counter next, shouting unintelligibly at the next shock of pain that spreads up his leg, settling somewhere in his hip.

He picks a bottle up from next to the sink, a beautiful, rather ornate glass thing, half filled with Freddie’s favourite, expensive cologne. It’s heavy in Roger’s hand, and he throws it at the wall above the tub as hard as he can. It explodes, filling the bathtub with broken glass and the small room with the sweet, almost overwhelming scent of Freddie. There are other bottles and pans and pretentious little containers lined up around the sink, full of makeup and perfumes and product for Freddie’s hair. Roger sweeps his arm over the counter and throws them all onto the floor, into the far wall. Some of the bottles explode into a rain of powder and broken glass, some just fall to the tile with a clatter that rings in his ears. “Fuck!” He shouts again, tinged with hysteria.

He curls his fingers into his palms, hands shaking. His reflection stares at him from behind the sink, pale, eyes wild. He screams, an inarticulate sound of rage or panic, he isn’t entirely sure, whirling around to look at the door as a knock is rapped against it.

“How’s it going in there, darling?”

Freddie’s voice, like he hasn’t had his ear pressed against the door, like he doesn’t know exactly how it’s going.

Roger rips the door open to glare at him, and just like he expected, Freddie sways, sitting crossed legged on the carpet, leaning into the door. “Fuck you,” he spits. There isn’t anything else in reaching distance that Roger can throw at him, so he storms between him and John instead, who’s also sitting on the carpet, chin propped up in his hand. He stomps his way into the kitchen, picking an empty glass up from the table and throwing it at the wall above the sink. It shatters.

“What do you think the test said?” John asks sarcastically, following him into the kitchen entryway, Freddie at his side. He isn’t even talking to Roger, but to Freddie, and it’s with a burst of outrage that Roger picks a plate up from the counter to whirl around and whip it at him with as much strength as he can muster. John ducks just in time, and the plate sails into the wall behind him, leaving behind a dent in the plaster.

He makes a startled noise as he staggers upright again. Freddie brings a hand up to grip John’s chin, making quick work of looking his boyfriend over for injuries as he says, “I fail to see how property damage and bodily harm are going to solve your problem.”

“Fuck you, that’s how,” Roger snaps. He turns to the sink again, making a grab for the dirty dishes piled onto the counter next it. He sweeps them all onto the floor, falling around him with a clatter but all of them mostly staying in one piece. “Fuck!” He cries.

“Is the plan to break everything I own?” Freddie asks.

Roger doesn’t actually have a plan outside of blind panic, but that sounds like as good an idea as any. He kicks one of the plates at his feet so hard it slide between Freddie’s legs and out of the kitchen. He kicks at one of the mismatched kitchen chairs next, an old, antique thing that Freddie had picked up from some thrift shop or another. He throws another mug at the wall above the table, one that’s half full and that soaks him with cold coffee, and then he makes a grab for the coffee maker. He has every intention of ripping the thing out of the wall, but John stops him before he can even get his hands on it, hand on his elbow.

“Not the coffee machine!” he snaps.

Roger turns to face him again, forcefully pulling his arm from John’s grip. He pushes at his chest, a fire burning just under his skin, more than ready to start a fight, but instead of stumbling back, John grabs Roger by the forearm and pulls him into a hug, crushing, nearly suffocating. Roger shouts again, furious, but John only tightens his arms around him until the fire under Roger’s skin is extinguished and suddenly, his legs aren’t strong enough to keep holding him up. He sags against Deaky’s chest, wrapping his arms around him, clutching at the back of his jumper with shaking hands. His eyes burn when he screws them shut, but he doesn’t want to cry. The knot in his chest is so tight that it aches.

He worries that he might shake apart in John’s arms, so he holds him tighter, pressing his face into his shoulder as he tries to take a deep breath around the lump in his throat. He feels drained, then. The panicked rage had been drained from him and now he just feels panicked and shaky and small.

Freddie’s quick to join them, wrapping his arms around them both and pillowing his head against Roger’s back. “They’re positive, then?” He asks softly.

Roger nods against John’s shoulder and doesn’t say anything for a very long time. He’s still shaking when he finally pulls away, but he feels considerably less like he’s gonna shake until he comes apart at the seams. He pulls from their arms, walks back to their trashed bathroom on shaky legs, and when he walks back into the kitchen he’s holding three separate pregnancy tests. He holds them out with trembling hands, showing them both the parallel lines, the little blue smiley face, the tiny pink plus sign. All three of them are very, unarguably positive. “Surprise,” he says, and his voice breaks.

“Oh, darling,” Freddie croons, pulling Roger into his arms again, and Roger sinks into him without a fight. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

“I’m fucked,” he says into Freddie’s shoulder, and his voice is thick. He’s determined not to start crying, but now that he’s clutching the tests in one hand it’s getting harder to pretend like it isn’t real, like he isn’t standing in Freddie’s kitchen in fuzzy socks and adidas trackies, shaking and fucking pregnant, what the _fuck_?

He pulls from Freddie’s arms again to rub at his face with the heels of his hands. “What the fuck?” He says out loud. He turns to the wall, throwing the tests at it. They bounce off, skittering across the linoleum in different directions, and it doesn’t help Roger feel even the least bit better. He kicks at the vintage chair again. “What the _fuck_?!” He cries.

He drops into the chair and puts his face in his hands. It kind of feels like the world’s tilting around him, making him queasy and unsteady on his feet. There’s something like anxiety twisting around inside his stomach, making him sick, making his heart beat a bit too quickly in his chest. There’s something like anxiety twisting around inside him, but maybe it’s not in his stomach, maybe it’s next to the baby that’s definitely, unarguably growing inside him. The thought makes him retch. It makes him retch but then something less angry, something like sorrow, crawls out from somewhere deep within him and makes itself known.

It’s not even that he doesn’t want a baby, because he does. He hadn’t for a long time, but that had changed when he met Brian. It had changed the second he met him, before they had started dating, back when he was just an obnoxiously tall, somewhat broody friend of Freddie’s with a crooked grin and long, pale fingers.

Roger’s never been with anybody before that makes him feel like Brian makes him feel. He loves him totally, wholeheartedly, and without a doubt he wants to spend the rest of his life with him, to start a family with him, to have his baby. He can almost picture it now, a tiny, angelic thing, a newborn, with a head of dark hair and Roger’s wide, striking eyes.

It sort of makes his stomach turn. He wants a family with Brian, but he doesn’t know if now’s the time. They’re young, for starters, they’re so young. They’ve been together for just over three years, but Roger’s still only twenty one, young and naive, selfish by nature. He likes drinking and he likes drinking coffee and he’s a smoker, for fuck’s sake. Then there’s the thing about them being uni students, perpetually busy and constantly broke. The flat they share off campus is small, even smaller than Freddie’s, probably not big enough for three of them. There’s been times when they’ve had to go a day or two without eating as they waited for a paycheque from either Brian’s job at the bookstore downtown or Roger’s at the clothing shop he works with Freddie. A month or so ago, they’d had to spend a week showering at Freddie and John’s, because between the four of them, they’d only had enough money to pay one water bill. Because theirs was the better bathroom, they’d all pooled their money together to pay the bill and the shower had been communal for a week or two. They’re broke, and they’re a mess, and they probably shouldn’t try to bring up a baby.

But then he thinks again of that newborn, wide eyed, his eyes, and maybe it’s the hormones, but he falls a little in love with it. He digs the heels of his hands into his eyes, and John’s hand stills on his back. “Talk to me,” he says quietly.

“I don’t know what to do,” Roger says weakly. “Tell me what to do.”

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking about the time we had to shower here because our water got cut off,” he says. 

Freddie snorts, and when Roger lifts his head to look at him, he’s leaning against the wall next to the table, arms crossed over his chest. “Don’t be daft, dear,” he says. 

“Fuck you,” he replies, a reflex.

Freddie waves a hand. “You know we’ll always look after you,” he says. “You’re always welcome to shower here if you need to, and that isn’t going to change if you have a baby with you. You’re actually going to be more welcome if you have a baby with you.”

Roger slowly leans back in his chair, stretching his legs out in front of him. “We should be able to take care of ourselves before we start thinking about a baby.”

Freddie makes another scoff of a sound. “You aren’t going to be doing it alone, darling. You’ll have all of us to help you. Besides, Deaky’s the only one of us that I would ever trust with a child. You should probably spend most of your time here, anyway. Oh!” He gasps suddenly, swatting at John’s shoulder. “We could set up a little nursery in the spare room for when the baby spends the night.”

It isn’t much of a spare room, it’s a tiny bit of space next to the bedroom that’s full of all the clothes that Freddie couldn’t fit in the closet. “Bold of you to assume I’d ever let you babysit over night,” Roger says.

Freddie lifts an eyebrow. “Let’s wait until you have a newborn that doesn’t let you sleep and then we’ll ask how you feel. You’ll be begging us to take her.”

Roger thinks of a little girl with a crooked grin and dark eyelashes, long blonde hair. He cracks a smile. “I’ll be tired, not deranged.” 

“We’ll see about that,” Freddie says, clicking his tongue. “She’ll be in good hands, darling, don’t worry. I wouldn’t let anything happen to my goddaughter.”

“Deaky’s gonna be her godfather,” Roger says automatically.

“I’ll be her godmother, then,” Freddie tells him, easy. “We’re going to be the best of friends, me and her.“

“I won’t leave them alone for a second,” John promises.

Roger smiles again, because it’s lighthearted banter, it’s funny, but something in his chest catches and his smile disappears. It’s lighthearted, but it isn’t a joke. It’s real life, it’s really happening and there’s a very real chance that nine months from now Roger could have a tiny, wide eyed little girl. He looks down at the table, tracing the grain with his thumbnail. “I’m scared,” he says quietly.

John’s hand finds his back again, rubbing slow, aimless circles against the fabric of his jumper. It’s about three sizes too big, and he’d stolen it from Brian’s side of the closet before he’d driven over to Freddie’s flat as soon as Brian had left for class. They were all supposed to be in class, technically, but Roger couldn’t put it off any longer, he needed to know, and he hadn’t wanted to be alone when he took the tests. They’d been sitting in his school bag for about a week, since he’d half mentioned his symptoms to Freddie at work and he’d asked, _well, you aren’t pregnant, are you_?

He was. He _is_.

He’d been very careful not to mention it to Brian. It had been hard, of course, because any time anything is wrong with him the only person he wants to talk to about it is Brian. Brian, who he knows would never judge him, or pressure him to do something he didn’t want to do; Brian, who, realistically, Roger knows wouldn’t be mad at him about this. Fear isn’t always rational, though, and Roger’s afraid. He’s afraid of what Brian will say, how he’ll look at him, what he’ll want him to do, what the future will be like for them no matter what they decide. He’s afraid, so naturally, he wants to talk to Brian, but he has no idea how he’s supposed to tell him. He swallows thickly, propping his elbows on the table to drop his head into his hands.

John’s hand doesn’t leave his back. “I know,” he says softly. He’s quiet for a moment. “When does Brian’s class let out?” 

“Two,” Roger says into his hands.

Freddie drops into the chair to his left, swinging a leg up to prop his foot in Roger’s lap. “It’s three past,” he tells him. A spike of anxiety rockets through Roger, making his palms ache as Freddie asks, “does he know you’re here?”

Roger shakes his head. When Brian had left for class, Roger had been playing ill, curled up on their makeshift bed that was really just a mattress propped up in the corner of the room. 

“Do you want us to tell him?” John asks, always calm, always rational. “Or do you want to meet him at home?”

Roger exhales slowly. He’s sort of tempted to invite Brian over, to have John and Freddie has witnesses or backup or whatever he might need, but he knows it’s probably a conversation they should have by themselves. “I think I should meet him at home.”

“Do you want a ride?” Freddie asks, and Roger turns his head to look at him, raising his eyebrows. 

“You don’t drive.”

“I was offering Deaky’s services,” he says.

John snorts, and Roger can’t help it, he cracks another smile. “That’s okay. I can drive myself. Thanks anyway, Deaky.”

“Yeah, don’t mention it,” he says sarcastically.

Roger flashes him a grin, trying to swallow around the lump in his throat as he pushes back from the table and stands up.

Freddie rises with him. “Call me if you need anything, dear,” he tells him. “Call me even if you don’t need anything. Call me to let me know how it goes.” Roger nods, leaning his head on Freddie’s shoulder as Freddie pulls him in for a hug. “I love you,” he adds.

Roger smiles again, much softer, more sincere. “I love you too,” he agrees.

“I know,” Freddie says, pinching Roger’s cheek as he pulls away. “Now, are you going to take those with you? Or am I going to have to touch something you’ve pissed on?” He asks, waving a hand towards the pregnancy tests spread on the linoleum, discarded but unbroken.

Roger rolls his eyes, but his heart is beating too quickly as he leans down to scoop them back into his hand. “I’ll save you the trouble,” he says.

“I knew I liked you for a reason,” Freddie says.

Roger looks down at them, turning them over in his hands a few times until John stops him, hand on his wrist, and pulls him into a hug. “It’s going to be fine,” he says.

He says it so definitively that Roger almost believes him. He hugs him tightly. “Thank you,” he says softly.

John squeezes him tightly before he lets him go. Roger takes another deep breath, making a beeline for the front room to grab his bag and thrust the tests back into it. He grabs his phone from the side table as he swings it over his shoulder, and there’s a line of texts waiting for him, all from Brian.

 _I’m leaving now. I’ll be home soon, love_.

Then, _I love you_ , like Roger didn’t already know that, and at least seven text bubbles of assorted heart and loving emojis.

A little bit of the weight lifts off of Roger’s chest. He takes another breath.

He stops in the kitchen doorway again, letting Freddie press a kiss to his cheek and letting Deaky tell him again that he’ll be okay in that sturdy, trustworthy way of his. He sits in his car for a long time before he can bring himself to pull away from the curb, and takes the long way home, driving a bit under the speed limit. He knows he’s being irrational, but knowing it doesn’t mean he can stop it. He’s scared, it’s that simple. He’s scared, and no matter what happens once he tells Brian, nothing is ever going to be the same again. Everything’s about to change. It’s scary.

He tries to take another breath, but his chest burns like he’s been running and he can’t quite take in enough air. He coughs around it, sitting in his car outside their flat building and trying to work up the nerve to go inside.

It takes a full seven minutes, but finally he’s able to drag himself out of the car and into the building. He takes the stairs as slowly as he can, and takes his time unlocking the door and pushing it open. He toes off his shoes, his heart beating so quickly in his chest he can feel it against his rib cage. It kind of hurts.

He creeps his way around the flat, ears ringing, but Brian isn’t home yet, so Roger lowers himself onto the couch, school bag in his lap, and he waits. He waits for what feels like an entire eternity, but that realistically is probably only a few minutes, until Brian’s key turns in the lock and the front door is pushed open across the room. Roger bites his tongue to keep himself from throwing up over his lap, watching as Brian pushes the door open and shoulders into the room, laptop in one hand and keys in the other.

Roger lifts a hand in greeting, too afraid to open his mouth, to speak, of what he might say.

Brian grins crookedly. “You’re up,” he greets, crossing the room to smack a kiss to Roger’s cheek, lowering his laptop onto the coffee table. “How are you feeling?”

Roger shakes his head, and Brian lowers his school bag onto the floor, sitting next to Roger on the couch. “Not any better?”

He looks down at his lap, at where his fingers are clutching the canvas of his bag so tightly his knuckles are white. “We need to talk,” he says, and his voice is hoarse, cracks partway through his sentence.

Brian doesn’t say anything, and it takes a long few moments before Roger can lift his head to look at him. His face is carefully blank. “You’re breaking up with me,” he says.

“What?” Roger asks, and it’s so ridiculous, the very idea, he can’t help the incredulous snort that manages to escape him, even through the anxiety.

“You’re not breaking up with me?” Brian asks, and the relief on his face is palpable. 

“Why would I break up with you?”

“Why were you waiting for me on the couch to tell me we need to talk?” He retorts, and Roger flinches. 

“I,” he starts, and his voice breaks again. “We need to talk,” he repeats.

Brian narrows his eyes. “And you’re not breaking up with me?” When Roger only shakes his head, he continues, “then what did you do?”

“It’s ‘what did _we_ do’, actually,” he corrects, and the suspicious look on Brian’s face doesn’t falter at all. Roger clears his throat. “It’s big,” he warns him, looking away, at the ceiling, so he doesn’t have to see the look on his face. “It’s gonna change everything and I don’t think you’ll hate me for it, but you might.”

“You’re scaring me, Rog,” Brian says. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know,” Roger admits. “I really don’t know. I think so? But I also broke a lot of Deaky’s cups today so I might be losing my mind.”

“What?” Brian asks. Then, “why were you at Deaky’s?”

“I didn’t wanna be alone,” he admits softly, looking back down at the bag.

“You’re really starting to freak me out,” Brian says. “What’s going on?”

Roger holds his breath, thrusting the bag in Brian’s direction, still without looking at him. He can hear the frown in his voice when he says, “if there are any human remains in here, Rog, I swear to God.” 

“I don’t — no. It’s — it might be worse?”

“What the fuck,” Brian says, completely void of emotion. “Worse than human remains?”

“It depends on how you feel about it, really,” Roger says, and he can taste his heartbeat. “It might be better.”

“Roger,” he says slowly. “What the fuck is in here?”

“Just open it,” Roger breathes, and screws his eyes shut.

Brian must hesitate, because a moment passes in silence before Roger hears him slowly, tentatively, unzip the bag. He hadn’t taken any care to hide the tests, just left them piled on top of scraps of paper and packs of gum and a spare phone charger, and he can hear, in the way his breath catches, the exact moment that Brian finds them. He doesn’t say anything for a long time.

“Roger,” he says finally, and Roger doesn’t open his eyes. “Roger, these are — are you —?”

Roger nods. “I am,” he says, voice small.

“You are,” Brian echoes. He's silent again, for a beat, two, and then he laughs, sudden and so loud it makes Roger jump. "You are," he laughs again, and when Roger cracks an eye open, he's holding the tests, looking down at them like they're something precious. "You're pregnant," he says, and he sounds like the wind's been knocked out of him. 

Roger nods slowly. "I am," he says, and then, dazed, "you aren't mad?" 

"I'm not — what?" He asks, looking up from the tests. "Why would I be mad? Did you think I'd be mad at you?" 

"No," Roger says, and then sighs, sagging into the back of the couch. "Maybe. I don't know." 

Brian laughs again, putting the tests down on the coffee table to pull Roger away from the back of the couch, into his arms. "I'm not mad," he promises, and Roger sags into his chest. "I couldn't be mad. We're having a baby, Rog," he says, laughing again, sounding stunned. 

"Yeah," Roger agrees quietly, but the tight coil of anxiety hasn't loosened in his chest. "I just — I know we don't really have the money right now to —"

"I'll get another job," Brian says instantly. "I'll get two other jobs. Three, if I have to. I'll drop out of school and work full time." 

Roger feels a smile spreading across his face, despite himself. "You won't drop out of school." 

"You're right," he says, "I probably won't drop out of school. But I'll figure something else out," he shrugs. "I'll do whatever it takes to take care of you both." 

A lump forms in Roger's throat again, but this time, it's an embarrassing, hormonal one, overwhelmed with how much he loves Brian, how much Brian loves him. He takes one of Brian's hands and slides it up, beneath his shirt, and settles it over the skin of his stomach. Instantly, Brian starts to thumb over his skin. "Freddie's already called dibs on godmother," he says. 

Brian snorts against his hair. "Absolutely not. Never." 

Roger smiles again, keeping his hand on Brian's, pressing against the layers of skin separating him and their baby. "Do you really think we're ready for this?" He asks softly. 

Brian doesn't say anything for a moment. "I don't know if anybody's ever ready," he says finally. "It's — it's going to be a lot, and it's going to be hard, but I think we can do it." 

"Do you think I'll be a bad parent?" Roger asks quietly. 

"I think you'll be an amazing parent," Brian says, and he doesn't hesitate. "We'll have to work on your impulse control, but that's why you have me." 

"Fuck you," Roger says, elbowing Brian with his free arm, but he laughs, he can't help it. 

Brian presses a kiss to his hair, and Roger can feel his grin. "I love you," he says, and for the first time since sitting on the edge of Freddie's tub, waiting for the tests, Roger feels like he can breathe properly. They can do it, the two of them. They'll make it work. 

Roger hums, lifting his legs to prop his feet on the coffee table. He leans his head back, pillowed against Brian's chest, one of Brian's big hands splayed across the pale skin of his stomach. It's almost scary, actually, how invincible he feels in Brian's arms. He wonders why he ever doubted either of them. "I love you," he says, and he means it.

**Author's Note:**

> if youve got any prompts of your own or even if you just wanna say hi feel free to drop me a line on [tumblr](http://sweetheaert.tumblr.com) im very friendly i promise


End file.
